Tom Pidcock finally looks back. He’s been away for the best part of 50km and much of it solo. With 10km to go it seemed his time was up as his lead was reduced to around ten seconds. Only he didn’t give up and he didn’t even seem to look back, all while the chasers behind couldn’t commit between them.
Paris-Nice starts this Sunday and this year’s Race to the Sun has attracted two stars in Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard. The pair duelled in the Tour de France last summer, now we’ll get to see if they can do it on a wet Wednesday in the Auvergne. Easier said than done in a high stress race with trapdoors in the opening days, a team time trial with a twist, and some rivals who will pounce if the two mark each other.
With the racing taking a brief lull, time to tot up the wins by team so far this season.
Also a quick glance at the promotion/relegation standings, it’s early but a regular reader request.
Dylan van Baarle has gone clear on the Haaghoek pavé and is joined by Florian Vermeersch, Jonathan Milan and Mathis Le Berre. They’re about to tackle the climb of Berendries where Milan will crack, then Vermeersch will pop on the next climb. This left Van Baarle with only Le Berre for company and little to worry about since the Frenchman had been in the early breakaway from the start.
The Belgian classics season opens this weekend. Yes the season has been raging for a month already and we’ve had plenty of action so far but the openingsweekend in Flanders always marks an increase in the intensity with fierce racing where riders scrap for position on narrow roads ahead of steep climbs or bone-shaking cobbled paths and where the action comes thick and fast in the final hour.
Einer Rubio won Stage 3 of the UAE Tour, attacking at the foot of Jebel Jais with the help of a brief leadout from his Movistar team mate Albert Torres. He then went away solo and held on for the win. It’s a big victoryr on climb normally all about being able to sit on a wheel while team mate mates set the pace; it’s not the story of someone sneaking away for a plucky win.
The route’s been unveiled and so time for some quick stage-by-stage notes. It looks like a hard edition with some promising “new” roads saved for the final weekend.
The race will take place between Sunday 4 June and Sunday 11 June.
Tadej Pogačar rode off to win the Clasica Jaén Paraiso Interior, leaving others in the dust (photo from Gomez Sport / race website). Yes it’s only a 1.1 race in February so just one thought rather than exhaustive analysis: UAE are riding much better as a team and their recruitment is starting to pay dividends. We saw this with Pogačar’s previous race, Lombardia but the new hires should reinforce this. Good news for him but for neutrals seeing a team riding a grand tour in train formation might be less inspiring.
Many sports are bringing in procedures to deal with concussion. For years a knock to the head has been part of the rough and tumble of sports but medicine has shown that one hit can cause brain trauma and crucially a second or repeat injuries can compound this and cause permanent brain damage.
Pro cycling’s started this process too and it’s very much a learning issue for team medics, race doctors and officials. There are guidelines and procedures which have been borrowed from other sports but they run up against cycling’s very nature of travelling across the landscape. James Knox’s disqualification from the Tour Down Under was instructive as it raised issues but I wanted to wait and take stock of the situation rather than replay one case.
Time for an update on the wealthiest people in pro cycling. If you thought this meant Tadej Pogačar, Remco Evenepoel or Egan Bernal, think again because this is about the people rich enough to hire these stars. As usual the point isn’t to fawn at the wealth but a “follow the money” piece so you know where some of the money coming into the sport originates from.
In part one here we’ll look at the team owners and sponsors and next week, others in and around the sport…